Cellphone popularity soars

Young adults and minorities are leading a revolution in how Americans use their cellphones.

People from age 18 to 29 and minorities are more likely to use their phones as personal computers, digital music players, cameras and more, an AP-AOL-Pew poll found.

?We?ve got everything on my phone,? said Mark Madsen, a 24-year-old college student from Chattanooga, Tenn. ?I use it mostly for the phone, but I also play video games and use the MP3 player. I pretty much use it all the time.?

Almost two-thirds of young adults use their phones to send text messages. More than half use them to take pictures and almost half to play games. They use these features, as well as Internet connections, about twice as often as cell phone users overall.

Minorities were far more likely than whites to use the phones to take pictures, send text messages and use the Internet, though the minority rates were influenced by enthusiasm among Hispanics ? who tend to be a younger population, the poll found.

Most cellphone owners prize them for traditional purposes like staying in touch with family and friends and helping in an emergency. Two-thirds say they would really miss their cellphones if they didn’t have them. Even more, three-fourths of cellphone users, say they?ve used them in an emergency and it really helped.

A fourth say they can?t imagine life without their cell phones.

Almost one-fourth of those polled say too many people try to get in touch with them on their cell phones ? just one of many headaches balanced against the devices? advantages.

The poll also found:

? More than a fourth, 28 percent, said they sometimes don’t drive as safely as they should because they are using a cell phone.

? More than a third, 36 percent, said they are sometimes shocked at the size of their service bill.

? Almost nine in 10 users of cellphones say they encounter others using those phones in an annoying way. Only 8 percent of cell users acknowledge their own use of cellphones is rude.